A Day In The Life

A boring Saturday and storing the summer into jars

Maybe one of the last days in summer, at least one of the warmer days.
I can feel fall already around the corner, not that I mind.
People, who know me, know that I like the wind in my hair, and that 25°C is pretty hot for me.

At least, the sun is shining and the weather is awesome.

Saturday – weekend – no chores, no duties.
A lazy day.
Got up quite late.

Some people told me that when getting older you will experience something they call “senile insomnia” – I am still waiting for that.
Although I have to admit, I can do without.
Read more on this at Helz-Design.com

How to create a Logo

Randomly I am going to introduce Logos, which I made.
We are talking about Logos of Companies.
Usually such a logo is made up of letters, sometimes a whole word or even a little picture.

A good logo has to be eye-catching and should be easily recognized again.
It represents the whole company.

These are the reasons to go to a designer and ask him / her to create a logo.

Certainly a logo has to serve more requirements. You are going to use it with different promo material.

1. A logo has to be clear and understandable.
   E.g. the chosen font has to represent the company and the given purpose.
   You would never chose a font for a bank, that might work for a day care.
   A bank is connected with integrity and sobriety. This has to be put into the logo.
   I am also choosing symbols, which are connected with the very company. Sticking to the bank: such a symbol could be coins. Nobody would do this, because it is too obvious in this case.

Wie sollte ein Logo aussehen?

In loser Reihenfolge möchte ich einige Logos vorstellen, die ich erstellt habe.
Wir reden hier von Unternehmslogos.
In der Regel besteht so ein Logo aus Buchstaben, eventuell dem ganzen Wort und manchmal auch grafischen Zeichen.

Ein gutes Unternehmenslogo sollte prägnant und wiedererkennbar sein und als Identifikationsmerkmal für das gesamte Unternehmen stehen:

Wenn ein Unternehmen ein Logo erstellen läßt, dann möchte das Unternehmen damit wiedererkannt werden.
Es soll einprägsam und unverwechselbar sein.

Natürlich muß es auch noch einige Anforderungen erfüllen, da es auf den unterschiedlichsten Werbemitteln benutzt wird.

1. Ein Logo muß verständlich sein.
   Die gewählte Schrift muß einerseits das Unternehmen repräsentieren und auch den gewählten Zweck.
   So wird ein Logo für eine Bank nicht in einer Schrift gestaltet werden, die man vielleicht für einen Kindergarten benutzen würde.
   Eine Bank verbindet man mit Seriosität und Ernsthaftigkeit, das muß im Logo rauskommen.
   Gleichzeitig verwende ich nur Symbole, die mit dem entsprechenden Unternehmen verbunden werden können.
   Am Beispiel der Bank: ein Symbol, das verständlich wäre, wären Münzen.
   Macht aber keiner, wäre zu offentsichtlich (in diesem Falle).

Outside a Book

A book cover is like a dress.

To me it should represent the personality of the lady wearing the dress.
So it also should represent the personality of the book it is covering.

Usually publishers have so many rules to follow, since most books are not the individuals we would like to see them as. They are part of editions.

So you have to obey the colors of the edition, you have to chose the same font, even the layout has been created by somebody else long time before.

Nothing very personal, especially not for the book.

I was lucky to create the shown above book covers just the way I wanted them to be.

The one with the airplane was done for my dad’s biography.
He was a dedicated glider pilot. So I was quite happy to engrave his name in the cockpit of this glider.

The pink one was made for the story of a defiant and stubborn child. She gave her father a hard and rough time. In the end she was so sweet, just like any 3 year old girl.
Sleeping child – proud daddy.

Avatar (3)

I love Photoshop.
Really I am a huge fan of it.

Working with it for ages.
When I first started I could hardly align a picture.

Yeah that’s not to difficult, but in fact that was all I was able to do with Photoshop. And to erase pixels that shouldn’t be there.

Hard to believe, right?

I took my chance, got classes in Photoshop – cool teacher I got.
He told me that he could only teach us about 20% of the power of Photoshop.

Imagine: 20% in a 160 hours course.

Then I got the advice to practice and practice and practice.

It is all about doing, working with it, experimenting.

Since these days I am addicted to Photoshop and to tutorials.
So now and then I adopt a tutorial and follow the steps – like a recipe for a wonderful pasta sauce.
And like following a recipe I also start while working with the tutorial to change it a bit.
Choosing a different color, taking a different photo, establishing a different idea.

The avatars in the photo above are results of such tutorial tweaking.

Offered a whole new world for me.

You get ideas how to do it.

Maybe by the moment I hold 50% of the powers of Photoshop in my hand?

Related articles

• 12 Video Tutorials for Improving Your Photoshop Skills (oxfordschoolofphotography.wordpress.com)
• 20 Free Photo Retouching Tutorials for Personal Historians. (dancurtis.ca)